Voter guide compares Bush, Kerry on Catholic social teachings.

In an effort to help Catholic voters evaluate candidates John Kerry and George W. Bush, not on one or two issues but on a broad range of Catholic Social Teaching, CTA has distributed nationwide The 2004 Voter Guide for People of Faith, prepared by the Catholic Action Network (CAN) for Social Justice in St. Louis, Mo. (www.catholicactionnetwork.org) A copy of the eight-page non-partisan resource has been inserted inside this issue of CTA News.

In early October the Guide was placed on the CTA website (www.cta-usa.org) where it can be downloaded and printed free, along with action ideas for its use, a sample letter to the editor, a Joan Chittister prayer and other resources. The Guide was also e-mailed to all CTA members whose e-mail addresses are known — some 6,900 of them. Meanwhile hard copies were mailed to 61,000 Catholic households beyond the CTA membership.

Beyond one-issue voting

Some Catholics, including bishops, would narrow the spectrum of voter issues to one or two and even exclude from the sacraments people who stray from their political judgments. But the U.S. bishops' conference is emphatically multi-issue. They write in their 2004 Challenge of Faithful Citizenship: “We hope that voters will examine candidates on the full range of issues and on their personal integrity, philosophy, and performance.” In distributing the Voter Guide, CTA is taking the same approach.

Each page of the Guide articulates one principle of Catholic Social Teaching, gives a current application and comment, then lines up in parallel Bush and Kerry columns a sample of each candidate's words and several of his specific actions responding to that principle.

Principles and issues covered in the guide are:

• Dignity of the Human Person
• Work and the Rights of Workers (minimum wages, overtime, taxes, etc.);
• Rights and Responsibilities (health care, education, housing, etc.);
• Promotion of Peace and Disarmament (treaties, weapons funding, terrorism, etc.);
• Preferential Option for the Poor (poverty, immigration, military spending, etc.);
• Stewardship of God’s Creation (global warming, energy policy, pollution etc.);
• Global Solidarity and Development (free trade, tax incentives, debt relief, etc.)

Contents of the guide came from four primary sources: NETWORK; the Leadership Conference of Women Religious, region VII; “On the Issues” candidate comparison, and the Social Justice Office of the Archdiocese of St. Paul/Minneapolis. Websites for these and other resources are listed in the guide and on both CAN and CTA websites.

The important thing is to urge everyone to vote. Can one vote with a Catholic conscience? Yes. As Challenge of Faithful Citizenship tells us, “The dual calling of faith and citizenship is at the heart of what it means to be a Catholic in the United States at this time.”

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